Hic!
by Silverbellsb
Summary: Rapunzel has been inflicted with the most annoying discomfort in life - hiccups! And how the heck is Flynn supposed to cure her when she can't stand on her head for less than three seconds?


**Hi, guys!**

**Somehow, I'm not able to stop writing these guys… heehee. Side adventures for Punzi and Flynn are just so… AWESOME! So this one takes place before they get to the Snuggly Duckling… at first I was about to write about Rapunzel discovering grass allergies, but how the heck did they cure those back then?**

**Lol. Anyhow, here's a little oneshot that takes on the most annoying discomfort in life… HICCUPS! Read and review, okay? Let me know what you think! **

O*O*O*O

Rapunzel had had hiccups before and therefore knew that they couldn't be cured by her magic hair. Oh, she'd tried before, when the incontrollable gasps of air had been driving her absolutely crazy. She'd sung the healing song over and over, each time with her hair wrapped around different place – her neck, her torso, even her mouth. All in vain.

So she'd given up on trying to cure hiccups and instead resorted to waiting the out, no matter how long or excruciating the wait may be. Of course, that didn't mean she'd stopped being annoyed by hiccups.

Unfortunately, exactly at the height of life's perfectness and joy, Rapunzel suddenly found herself outside her tower for the first time _ever, _on her way to see her dream – the floating lanterns – alongside her pet chameleon Pascal and a funny, thieving, overly-confident man who called himself Flynn Rider; except she had just been plagued by hiccups.

Let's just say that a random bullfrog happened to somehow scare the wits out of her, therefore inflicting her with hiccups, and Flynn found the whole thing hilarious.

"That wasn't funny." Rapunzel scowled, gripping her frying pan. Pascal threw in some threatening gestures for good measure.

"Aw, c'mon, Blondie. You gotta admit, it _was_ entertaining." Flynn got to his feet while brushing dirt from his vest. "And look at it this way – if the frog is scared of your scream, it's smart. It won't bother coming back. Now let's get out of here. The sooner we leave, the sooner you can see the lanterns. The sooner you see the lanterns, the sooner we can get back and I'll get my satchel. Okay? Good. Alright, let's go!" He grabbed her arm and crashed through the forsythia before she could come up with another argument.

As he dragged her through a patch of dandelions, she opened her mouth to retort, but it was interrupted by a loud, _"Hic!"_

"I'm sorry. Come again?" Flynn twisted around to look at her.

"It's nothing. I mean – _hic!_"

Flynn cocked his head at her. "You okay, Blondie? You sound like you swallowed a bar of soap."

"It's just a few _hic – hic_ – hiccups." Rapunzel groaned mentally. Just what she needed! Nothing like a bad case of the hiccups to wreck the most perfect day of your life. She should've remembered that the Fates weren't particularly kind.

_Hic!_

"Hiccups, huh?" Flynn looked amused.

"That's – _hic!_ – what I said. _Hic!_" Now poor Pascal was being bounced up and down on her shoulder with every hic. He squeaked indignantly, but there was nothing she could do, other than allow him to tie a lock of hair around his little chameleon middle like a harness.

"Well, can't have that, can we?" Flynn shook his head. "Sometimes I wonder if the entire world is out to get me. First I lose my satchel, then I get taken prisoner, and now I've forgotten every cure there is for hiccups. You should know, Blondie, that I hate noise pollution." He winced as she hiccupped for thirty seconds straight before replying.

"There are cures?" she asked after taking several gulps of air and narrowing her eyes at him. "I've never heard of any."

"That's not surprising, considering you didn't know what a man looked like till a few hours ago." Flynn tossed his head and flashed a dazzling grin in her direction, but Rapunzel had no clue what it was supposed to mean. Men were _so_ weird…

"Well, that's true," she agreed. _"Hic!"_

Flynn sighed. "Guess those hiccups aren't going anywhere until we do something about them."

She eyed him warily. "What do you – _hic!_ – have in mind?" It had better not include poking with pins or cutting her hair or over-exposure to the sun or potions made from newts and moss sludge…

"Give me a sec." Flynn leaned his head against the trunk of a tree a little too hard. "Ouch!"

Rapunzel giggled. _Hic!_

After Flynn finished pouting, he said, "Okay, I've got one. It doesn't always work, but it's worth a shot."

"What?" _Hic-cup!_

O*O*O*O

"Well, _that _was dumb," Rapunzel huffed between hiccups. "Now my dress is soggy."

"I _told_ you it doesn't always work," Flynn retorted. "And I can't help it if the position is inconvenient."

"How am I supposed to swallow when I'm upside down, anyway?" she complained. "All the water just goes up my nose."

"You weren't upside down. You were half-slouching with your feet in the air." Flynn lay down and demonstrated. Rapunzel couldn't help but laugh since he looked like a spaz.

He rolled over next to her. "If you want, I could dangle you from a tree while you drink," he offered slyly.

"No!" Rapunzel pictured herself swaying helplessly from side to side over a forest floor miles below her.

Flynn shrugged. "Suit yourself."

"You said there are more cures," she reminded him.

"Oh. Well, there's always the option of grinding up your little froggy pal over there and putting him in stew. If he's a frog prince, you'll be cured."

"No!" Rapunzel shrieked, grabbing protectively at Pascal. "And anyway, he's a _chameleon_, not a frog!"

"My bad," Flynn muttered, shooting wary looks at the little reptile, who was flashing an intimidating rainbow of colors in an attempt to keep Flynn in line. "I'll try a few more cures, but if they don't work, we'll have to dunk you in the river. That's the best cure of all, if you don't mind the leeches."

Shuddering, Rapunzel nodded. _Hic!_

O*O*O*O

"Ouch. Blondie, stop kicking me."

"Sorry," Rapunzel said. Her arms dangled limply, and she was starting to see spots. "Why do half these stupid cures have to do with standing on your head?"

Flynn shrugged. "Don't ask me – I didn't think them up."

"Who did, then?"

"Some high-and-mighty alchemist trying to get gold," he suggested. "Or an old crone with too much time on her hands."

"Mmmf," was the response.

"'Mmmf'? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Mmf."

"Never mind. Your hiccups gone yet?" He loosened his grip on her ankles just a bit, enough to let her slip down slightly.

"MMF!" _Hic! _

Flynn let her down gently. Rapunzel rubbed her eyes. Thank goodness – her head felt as it were about to explode. Even after thinking of the color blue, repeating her name backwards (Leznupar) ten times, and balancing upside down (actually, she had to recruit Flynn to hold her ankles), her hiccups were persistent as ever.

"Sorry, Blondie," Flynn said. Clearly, he was trying not to laugh.

"Don't – _hic!_ – worry about it." She sighed. Her poor diaphragm was starting to feel stressed because of all the hiccups. She felt as though she'd run a mile. Was this one of the many curses Mother had mentioned – the kind that befell girls who disobeyed their mothers?

Time to admit defeat. Her dream just wouldn't be the same if she were hiccupping while watching those beautiful lanterns rise in the sky. She was already exhausted – what was that?

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a shiny green bulge resting on a tree stump inches away from her ear. Panic rose inside her as the same awful bullfrog she'd met before fixed its enormous, bulging eyes on her. She slowly reached a hand behind her, groping for her frying pan.

"Hey Goldie, you're awfully quiet." Flynn's voice interrupted her panic attack. "See any living dead?"

Then he spied the bullfrog. "What's – oh," he sighed. "Hey, isn't that the same frog you saw before?"

And believe it or not, it was the exact same frog that had cruelly inflicted Rapunzel with a case of devastatingly persistent hiccups.

"Well, fancy that," Flynn mused. "Looks like he has a bone to pick with you, Blondie."

Rapunzel now had her frying pan. She gripped it with both hands, slowly raised it above her head –

_RIBBIT. _

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Rapunzel's bravado disappeared as she leaped to her feet, threw the frying pan at the frog (which, by the way, missed by a mile in her terrified state), and raced over to Flynn, who was her only source of protection. Before he could blink, she had scrambled up and wrapped herself around him like a monkey in a tree, clutching him for dear life, still screaming in his ear.

"_FROG!"_ she screeched. _"Do_ something, Flynn!"

Flynn had been watching the entire spectacle with amusement, all through which the bullfrog remained quite serene. That wouldn't do – it was either bullfrog or Blondie, and although he would have liked nothing better than to put her back in her tower, he knew which would have to go. He kicked a stone in the bullfrog's direction. The stone missed, but the offending amphibian got the message. It blinked twice and hopped away.

Rapunzel peeked out from behind his head. "Is it gone?" she whispered.

"Not for long; it's busy recruiting a whole army of frogs to come after you now that you've tried to smash it with a frying pan," Flynn responded. "Yeah, it's gone." Then he gasped, for now the terrified girl's arms were blocking off his wind pipe. "Hey, Blondie," he choked out. "Mind coming down from there? I can barely breathe."

Rapunzel cautiously loosened her grip and peered around in case the frog was still around before sliding to the grass. Flynn flopped down and took a few deep breaths. Wow, that girl had a killer grip.

Rapunzel looked sheepish. "Sorry 'bout that," she said as she retrieved her frying pan. "I guess I'm still jumpy."

Flynn snorted. "No kidding."

"Well, frogs are scarier than bunnies," she pointed out.

"But you _own _a frog."

"For the last time, he's a _chameleon_." Rapunzel rolled her eyes. Pascal glared, too. Miraculously he'd managed to stay on board despite the wild romp and brief moments of levitation.

Flynn ran a hand through his hair. "Say that again?"

"I said, he's a chameleon and his name is Pascal, not Froggy, and we'd both appreciate if you remembered it, and for your information, he's – hey! Hey hey HEY!" Rapunzel's hand flew up to her neck in amazement.

Flynn glanced wildly around before sprinting over and covering her mouth. "Lower the voice, Blondie. There are guards looking for me everywhere, and the first place they'd check is wherever the damsel in distress is. And from the way you keep shouting like that, you'd make a likely candidate."

Rapunzel ignored him. "Hey!" she said again. "My hiccups! They're… gone!"

"I wondering when you'd notice," Flynn grumbled. Against all willpower, he was smiling.

"The frog must've scared them away," she mused out loud. "And now…" She giggled with delight and bounced up and down, twirling to and fro, side to side. "They're gone! My hiccups are gone! Thank you, Mister Frog! Thank you!" She blew a kiss in the direction she had last seen the bullfrog and resumed dancing around.

Flynn watched her, amusement plainly written on his face.

She kept twirling. "They're gone, gone, gone! My hiccups are gone!" What a relief. Her diaphragm no longer felt tired, her windpipe could take a break, and she was free! Free, free, free –

_Hic!_

Rapunzel stopped short. One hand flew up to her neck. But no, she wasn't the one who had hiccupped…

_Hic!_

Flynn groaned. _Hic! Hic! Hic!_

"Please tell me you're the one who – _hic!" _Flynn covered his mouth and whirled on her. _Hic!"Hey!"_

THE END

O*O*O*O

**Ha! Poor Flynn… **

**This is actually based off something that happened to my friend… she leads the most interesting life. :) Who knew hiccups could be contagious?**

**Now : GET YOUR CURSOR ON THAT BUTTON DOWN THERE AND REVIEW!**

**I said to review!**

**DO IT!**

***Peace!***

_**Silverbells**_


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